By Steven Gordon, Lemonade Day National President

“Youth entrepreneurship is growing rapidly in the United States and internationally. The lessons kids learn by taking an idea and going out and executing it are so important and critical to learning. The combination of experiential learning and how to apply knowledge from inside and outside the classroom is a vital skill to empower youth to own their path.”

By Craig Zamary, The Blog, Huffington Post

           “Young Entrepreneurs - Coolest Youth Startups in the United States,” updated Feb. 6, 2017

            https://www.huffingtonpost.com/craig-zamary/young-entrepreneurs-coole_b_9178390.html

 

In the blog post referenced here, serial entrepreneur Craig Zamary wrote about eight of the “Coolest Youth Startups” in America.” Noting that these young entrepreneurs stretched their business acumen beyond the basic foundation-setting skills acquired by those who own and operate a lemonade stand, Zamary chose Moziah Bridges as one of his “coolest” examples. Moziah launched Mo’s Bows at age 9. He is one of the youngest entrepreneurs to have appeared on Shark Tank. Moziah is now 15, and Mo’s Bows had expanded its portfolio beyond bow ties to include pocket squares and other accessories. Earlier this year, Mo’s Bows entered into a major licensing agreement with the National Basketball Association to produce an “NBA Collection.” SWEET DEAL!

I am proud of the fact that Lemonade Day has our Shark Tank superstar in the form of Mikaila Ulmer of Austin, Texas, who launched her lemonade business via Lemonade Day at the age of 4. Now 13, Mikaila is an inspirational “Poster Teen” for Lemonade Day: she is the founder of Me & The Bees Lemonade, a bottled natural lemonade product line which is being distributed in supermarkets, hotels and specialty stores throughout the United States.  Me & The Bees attracted $800,000 in angel funding from professional athletes and executives about this time last year, and like Mo’s Bows, is continuing to grow.

Young people like Moziah and Mikaila are shining ambassadors for Kid Entrepreneurship. Lemonade Day leaders in our national headquarters in Houston and in Lemonade Day host cities in the US and Canada are gearing up to engage 75,000 kids in Kindergarten through Fifth Grade to become lemonade business owners in 2018.  We know without a doubt that the Lemonade Day experience makes a powerful impact on young people and the caring adults who support them.   We have results of surveys and studies to validate that Lemonade Day is “Building the Future, Stirring Up Success.”

In 2017, Lemonade Day celebrated its tenth anniversary. This year, the national Lemonade Day headquarters leadership wanted to assess the results and impact that Lemonade Day has had on participants over the years. In addition to collecting the immediate impact from Lemonade Day Business Results and Mentor Survey (see blog post for Oct. 24, 2017), we developed another survey to find out more about the longer-term impact of Lemonade Day on past participants. The survey was intended to determine the impact on the youths’ future goals, hopes, and attitudes, along with their entrepreneurial motivation. We determined that an effective way to show program strength would be to secure feedback from those who participated in Lemonade Day compared with other American youth programs.

Working with Joe Daly, National Lemonade Day Board Member and a Director at Gallup, a survey was devised that would correspond to questions that Gallup is asking youth in its Gallup polls. That way, Lemonade Day could ask participants the same questions and find out if Lemonade Day kids answered the questions any differently.

Here is a quick summary of the Impact Survey responses to four key questions from past Lemonade Day participants:

• 72% said they plan to start their own business

• 64% said they will invent something that changes the world

• 80% said they could find lots of ways around a problem

• 31% said they are running their own business today

(Compared to the Gallup-Hope Index poll, Lemonade Day youth responded that they run their own business now at a level that is 8 times that of students in grades 5 through 12.)

In addition to these questions, youth were also asked about their specific experience with Lemonade Day. The results showed that 90% of survey respondents hosted a lemonade stand and 91% of that group made a profit, with 83% saving at least some of their profit. The survey also showed that on average, about 3.2 youngsters work at a lemonade stand together.

I am happy with these results, and I encourage you to learn more about the methodology behind the findings of 2017 Lemonade Day Impact Study. Please visit https://lemonadeday.app.box.com/s/u1epaofeif98fqxqkqanvukvqrdiq8qb  to access the White Paper.

Thank you for your support.

About Lemonade Day

Founded in Houston in 2007 by Michael and Lisa Holthouse, Lemonade Day is a non-profit organization dedicated to teaching every child across North America the business and financial skills that are the key ingredients of entrepreneurship. By learning these skills early in life, children will be better prepared to be successful, financially healthy adults. Through our fun, hands-on program Kids K-5 are empowered to start their very own business—a lemonade stand—and experience the feeling of earning real money, using 100% of their profit to spend, save and share based on their own goals.

Lemonade Day is in 62 cities throughout the United States. Over the past 10 years, we have served more than 1 million kids in our kid entrepreneur programs and in 2016 alone, 101,000 kids participated in Lemonade Day.

Visit LemonadeDay.org to learn how to participate in Lemonade Day in your city.